City of Tshwane Mayor Randal Williams announced that the city has invested R46 million to “accelerate repairing of potholes and reduce the current [maintenance] backlog.”
So far, this money has been spent on upgrading the Bon Accord quarry crusher plant in Onderstepoort to operate more efficiently and produce materials for the building and maintenance of roads, reported BusinessTech.
“The refurbished plant will significantly assist us in increasing the production of hot asphalt so that we can ensure adequate maintenance of roads and pothole repairs across the city,” said the mayor.
“With this plant, the city will produce its own road building and maintenance materials. The materials will be used further for the city to produce its own hot-mix asphalt, ready-mix concrete, and build/maintain tar roads,” he said.
Mayor Williams said the recent rains have exacerbated the poor condition of the roads but that the city is “pushing to reduce potholes.”
How much it costs to fix potholes
Transport Minister Fikile Mbalula in April 2021 said it will cost an estimated R700 to R1,500 per square metre to repair potholes in South Africa’s road network.
However, he added that completely removing potholes from all roads would be a near-impossible task.
“It is difficult to eradicate potholes on the road network as the emergence of new potholes depends entirely on the extent and nature of rainfall in that month or year,” said Mbalula.
He further said the national road network was not designed to carry the massive amounts of traffic it is forced to accommodate, which worsens matters.
In February 2022, Mbalula said the national road network will not be maintained for the next 10 years due to the bulk of Sanral’s income being used to service debt incurred by the e-toll project.
“The provincial road network condition has been on a steady decline since the early 1990s due to several reasons that include a curtailed funding allocation and the shrinking project output by the road sector,” said Mbalula.
Approximately 80% of the 750,00km of roads in the country have reached the end of their 20-year design life at that time, he said.
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